When the world’s most powerful luxury conglomerate buys into an Indian restaurant, eyebrows rise. LVMH’s acquisition of a large stake in Dishoom (Instagram), a London-based Indian restaurant chain famous for its black dahl and endless queues, might seem eccentric at first glance. But beneath the surface, this is a strategic move that says more about the future of luxury than another diamond-studded Louis Vuitton trunk ever could.
For decades, luxury has been defined by scarcity. The model was simple: make it rare, make it exorbitant, and let exclusivity do the rest. But scarcity has its limits. There are only so many yachts, Birkin bags, or $100 million Basquiats the ultra-rich can purchase before the logic collapses in on itself. Desire, after all, is not infinite.
That ceiling is now visible in the art world. Auction houses report fewer stratospheric sales, but more transactions at the mid-tier, between €5,000 and €50,000, where collectors find both access and excitement. Instead of one hedge fund magnate claiming a Koons, hundreds of younger buyers are snapping up emerging painters. The revenue spreads differently, but crucially, it spreads wider. The art market has learned what luxury is learning: cultural energy no longer sits exclusively at the top.
Enter Dishoom. The restaurant is not luxury by any traditional metric. You won’t find white tablecloths or three-Michelin pomp. What you will find is a two-hour wait for a table, an atmosphere that thrums with nostalgia and warmth, and a menu that has quietly embedded itself into London life. Dishoom sells more than food, it sells belonging, ritual, and a slice of cultural mythology. To eat there is to participate in a story.
For LVMH, that story is irresistible. Investing in Dishoom is not dilution of the brand’s luxury DNA, it’s diversification. It’s a recognition that aspiration doesn’t always look like champagne towers; sometimes it looks like a crowded breakfast table with friends, tearing naan and sipping chai. If luxury is meant to capture desire, then it must follow where desire lives. Right now, that’s not only in the penthouse – it’s in the queue outside a restaurant that makes people feel something.
This move raises a bigger question: is the future of luxury about exclusivity at all? Or is it about ubiquity, finding ways to weave into the fabric of everyday culture, to become an object or experience people return to again and again? LVMH seems to be betting on the latter.
Dishoom, with its blend of accessibility, atmosphere, and obsessive following, is not an anomaly: it’s a blueprint. The next frontier for luxury not be the rarest object in the room, but the most beloved one?
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